Old friends become family at Christmas

There is a saying that resonates with many people around the holidays, when everyone seems to be celebrating the importance of family. "Friends are the family you choose for yourself."

KIETRYN ZYCHAL

There is a saying that resonates with many people around the holidays, when everyone seems to be celebrating the importance of family. "Friends are the family you choose for yourself."

In this way, Anna May Cannon and Joyce Bush have become like mother and daughter. "I call her my adopted Mum," Bush said.

Cannon is a 95-year-old resident at the Pleasant Valley Nursing Home, and Bush was her neighbor for more than 30 years. Bush still lives in the same Marshalls Creek neighborhood where Cannon and her late husband Frank built a small motel a long time ago, though Cannon is not sure exactly when.

Her memory is far from perfect, but she is happy to share the gist of the details of her life. She was born Annie Mary Lee in 1912, the first of six siblings who grew up in County Mayo, Ireland. She was sent to America to live with an aunt in the Philadelphia area when she was 15 years old. Perhaps the aunt went back to Ireland. Perhaps not. But Cannon eventually wound up living with another family for whom she worked as a domestic.

Cannon met her husband Frank, and the young married couple moved to the Poconos to build a little motel, sometime in the 1940s or 1950s. When asked how many rooms it had, she wasn't sure — perhaps 12 — but she remembered one thing. "I know we had a lot of sheets to wash. And we had a Sylvan pool," she boasted. "I cleaned it every day. It was a little show place. A beautiful pool," she remembered.

Cannon lost touch with her family in Ireland during her eight decades in America. A few years ago, she asked her friend Joyce Bush to help her find out what happened to her four brothers in the old country. She knew her younger sister had died as a child.

Bush wrote a letter addressed to the postmaster of County Mayo, Ireland, asking him if he knew anything about the family of Annie May Lee.

This may make you weep for the simple life, but the postmaster remembered the Lee family. He sent an e-mail to a Dominick Lee Jr. in London, England.

As it turned out, Dominick Lee was the son of Annie May Lee's brother Dominick. Lee has since sent pictures to America of the little village his aunt Anna May left in Ireland. According to Bush, "Dominick has never been to America, but he hopes to come visit next year."

Cannon is a exuberant soul with a teasing sense of humor. When asked how she met her husband, she replied, "He went to the same jail I did."

Cannon also enjoyed interrogating her interviewer.

"Are you married?" she asked. A negative answer prompted this lively monologue from Cannon. "It's just as well. He'd always want to know, 'Where are you going?' and 'What time are you coming back?' 'I'm going to see my mother.' 'You went to see your mother six months ago. Why don't you move in with her?'"

Cannon enjoys visits from Bush and her two Labrador retriever puppies, the black Samantha and the golden Annie. Pleasant Valley Nursing Home allows visits from pets as long as the owner obtains a "pet pass" with proof of a current rabies vaccination.

Bush is not married, and her parents and only sister have died. Her family has lived in the Poconos for generations but were among the victims of the 1955 flood. "We lost six relatives at a farm near the Pine Brook Camp," she recalled.

Cannon is very happy at the Pleasant Valley Nursing home and Bush is happy she lives there, too. "The staff is wonderful here. Some residents don't get visits, even on the holidays. I wish more people could have a relationship like the one I have with Anna May," Bush said. "She's my family."